


I Used to Be an Adventurer Like You, Then I Took an Arrow to the Knee

by audreycritter



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Booster Gold Briefly Appears in the Wild, Gen, TW: Blood, Time Travel, batcat mentioned - Freeform, brief appearance by cass, brief appearance by tim, defacing of world monuments, father-daughter’s best friend bonding, historic weaponry, in which I ignore adoption erasure, no profreading we die like mne, wibbly-wobbly rebirth canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 22:08:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16437716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audreycritter/pseuds/audreycritter
Summary: Stephanie was just on patrol and now she’s stuck somewhere, sometime, with Bruce.They bleed and bond and mostly try to keep each other alive— you know, just a Tuesday.





	I Used to Be an Adventurer Like You, Then I Took an Arrow to the Knee

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Boostergoldsmissingarm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Boostergoldsmissingarm/gifts).



> written for the wonderful lovely boost :)
> 
> set before the disaster of Batman 50, and before Tim and Stephanie leave town, and the dumpster fire of RHATO and Nightwing after that.

Leaves crunched under Stephanie Brown’s foot while she tried to quell her queasy stomach. She looked down, at the dried brown and rust red forest carpet under her black boot, and frowned.

There should have been asphalt there.

She looked around at…trees and brambles, instead of high rise buildings and street lamps.

“Hello?” she called, turning slowly. “Hull- _oh_?”

An arrow whistled past her ear and she dropped into a crouch, a batarang in her hand as she hunted for the source.

“Spoiler,” came the familiar command from just out of sight up a slight ridge. She sprinted and dropped over the embankment just as two more arrows flickered over her head. They slammed, quivering, into trees another ten yards off.

Batman was there, pressed against the wall of dirt, with one hand against his arm. Blood seeped over his fingers and even with the cowl on she could imagine the hard, annoyed squint of his eyes. His mouth was a flat line, but that wasn’t unusual.

“Hiya,” she said, breathless after the dive and the near hits. “Wanna tell me why I’m playing William Tell?”

“The son,” Batman said through gritted teeth. There were shouts and the rustle of footsteps behind them, drawing closer, but slowly.

“You’ve got like, four or five,” Stephanie said. “You’re going to have to be more specific but just as a hunch, my money’s on Duke. It’s about time for something to be his fault, y’know? Gotta wear off that new kid shine.”

“No,” he said, tersely. He shifted and grimaced and pulled his fingers away briefly to look at his own arm. There was a low swear and his hand clapped back over the wound. A fresh swell of blood dripped over and down the gauntlets.

“No, not Duke.”

“Tell’s son,” Batman said irritably. “William was the archer.”

Stephanie’s mouth dropped open. “You are…god, you are the _worst_ at jokes.”

“Thought you’d,” he paused, “figured that out a long time ago.”

“Someone told me to keep people underestimating my intelligence,” Stephanie said, scurrying to the other side of him. She popped a compartment on her belt open and pulled out an emergency bandage.

He didn’t make a sound while she wrapped the sealing bandage directly over his torn sleeve, though a muscle in his jaw twitched when she pressed the rubbery material as hard as she could directly onto the wound through the tear. As soon as her hands fell back, her gloves dark with his blood, he rolled into a crouch.

“Fighting or fleeing?” Stephanie asked. “Where the hell are we, even?”

“Retreat,” he said. “We need the lay of the land and more information.”

So, he didn’t know either. That was just great. Stephanie crouched beside him, ready to sprint. When he took off, his cape flaring, she was at his side. Even with her legs stretched to eat up ground, he could have gradually lost her, but didn’t. Stephanie didn’t know what to make of the fact that he was sticking close, if it was protection or lack of trust.

Arrows whizzing over their heads, close enough to hear the whir of their passage through the air near her hood, kept her from dwelling on that too long.

“They’re warning shots,” she realized, when Batman drove them both sideways to skirt a large bramble patch. The trees got closer together, the ground more cluttered with leaves and sticks, and Stephanie dropped back just enough to echo his steps on the narrow path down the slope. Each footfall had been tested by his boots and it was better than trying to find her own.

“Hn,” was all he said.

There was a low stone wall, not crumbling, but crudely made of uncut and unpolished rocks stacked together. They cleared it in sync, and with a final arrow slamming into a tree yards ahead with a spray of flecking bark, the volley behind them stopped. They didn’t slow for another fifty yards.

“I guess we’re not trespassing anymore,” Stephanie panted, when they stopped by the deep groove of a struggling creek. It was narrow and flanked with dry pebbles, and a foot of sheer dry dirt, with only a trickle of water carving through the eroded path.

“Stay here,” Batman said tersely, turning noiselessly on the ball of his foot. Stephanie was good at being quiet, but her training had been primarily for rooftops and cracked concrete and pitted asphalt littered with broken bottles. One step forward resulted in a stick cracking underfoot, a thunderous noise in the sudden quiet that had drenched them when their flight had stopped. She froze, then crept back toward the creek bed and slipped down to take low cover there.

After a moment, Batman returned with the final arrow in his hand. He spotted her after scanning the bank, taking long enough that Stephanie felt a twinge of pride, and then slid down to join her.

“Well, Robin Hood? Is it Nottingham again?” Stephanie whispered, peering over his arm as he turned the arrow shaft in his fingers. The fletching was papery cream with smeared black markings and flecks of brown and red. The arrowhead was intact, and from the splinters on his gloves she assumed he’d cut it out of the tree with a batarang.

“They’ve been at war,” Batman said. “The peace treaty is recent, if there is one. They lost territory. Or maybe they’re hiding someone.”

“Are you hiding some sort of note that was tied to that?” Stephanie asked, adjusting her mask. “I can’t tell if you’re testing me or if you get off on being withholding.”

Batman turned his head just enough to give her a Look, but his attention was quickly absorbed by the arrow again. He twisted it to hold the arrowhead close to his cowl, and then moved it toward her face so she could see it better.

When he spoke, his voice was calm and patient and far too unruffled for someone who had been displaced in time or space or whatever reality had been messed with.

“This is a plate cutter bodkin. They were— are— used for war, for piercing plate armor. It puts us in the 15th or 16th century, Europe. Along with the wood pigeons that flocked by heading south, likely Great Britain in early autumn. The arrow shaft is poplar, which was common, but what do you see here?”

Once upon a time, Stephanie had enjoyed teasing Tim for how he hung on Bruce’s words. And then she had been his Robin, and it hadn’t seemed so amusing. She’d done it, too. Now, despite everything between them, that steady voice flooded her with warmth; it seemed to come so naturally to him, the teaching and guided instruction to detail. Maybe it was because he thought you were worth his time, to teach and explain things to. Maybe it was the sense that he was as eager for you to learn and know things as anyone could be, that he trusted you to be smarter, notice more, remember.

There were times his disappointment and criticism could be crushing. Stephanie knew that all too well. It had taken her a long time to see that it was because he genuinely thought they were each capable of being better, someday maybe even better than him— she’d seen it when he’d let Dick lead a case, or given tasks over to Tim and Cass and even her without a word of instruction.

Sure, sometimes he pushed too hard, but Stephanie had lost enough people by this point to know what fear could do to someone. Hadn’t she done the same to Tim, cut him out the first whiff of possible betrayal? Stephanie had too many of her own trust issues to waste time pointing fingers, even if he did have plenty of flaws. Plenty of flaws she was all too happy to remind him about when the mood was right.

Right now, she didn’t know where the hell she was, but Batman seemed to have a better idea so she leaned forward and squinted at the browned arrow.

“Blood stains,” she said.

“Hn,” he said, with a faint nod. “They’re reusing the shafts when they can. What do you notice about the fletching?”

One of those sometimes-flaws, sometimes-features was making teaching moments feel like pop quizzes nobody had told her she was even in the class for. When she didn’t know, she felt stupid even when he was willing to explain without censure; when she did know, she felt on top of the world.

“It’s not feathers,” she said. “It’s parchment. Illuminated manuscript, I think.”

The thin press of his lips quirked into something like a pleased smile and Stephanie’s toes curled in her boots. It was hard to keep from beaming because she knew she’d impressed him, knowing just a bit more than he’d expected.

“Didn’t see that coming, bitch,” she said, poking her elbow into his rock-hard side. “Spoiler spoils again.”

She sensed, rather than heard, his repressed sigh.

“Okay,” she said, after a moment of silence. “Spill. Your turn. Tell me how you got from point A to Z there, big guy.”

His gloved finger nudged the fletching.

“Gray goose was the preferred feather for fletching in this era and region. Parchment was used in emergencies— which means they’re low on supplies and were recently on the move. But they aren’t now.”

“Because they have a boundary line,” Stephanie said, craning her head to see the far-off stone wall. “One they haven’t mortared yet.”

“Hn,” he said, a little affirmative grunt. “Without further investigation, I would assume they billeted a monastery or landed noble’s house. Something with a library. They must be desperate to keep it, or they wouldn’t be cutting into the books.”

“Great,” Stephanie said. “A+ detective work. What the hell are _we_ doing here? I was just trying to finish a regular patrol, last thing I remember.”

Batman pulled a small charm out of his utility belt and spun it. Stephanie gaped at him, and it, like he had been replaced with some sort of convincing robot.

“Are you…doing magic? With a Nightwing keychain?”

The blue winged v stopped spinning on its little metal chain and then swung back and forth in a tiny, lazy arc.

“It’s not a dream or a dream world,” he said, returning the keychain to his belt.

“The fuck,” Stephanie said, raising her eyebrows. “Batdad. B-man. Bobby— don’t make that face, Dick told me— did you just…is that a totem? Like from _Inception_? Are you trusting Mr. DiCaprio’s script delivery with our lives?”

“Not all of that film was science fiction,” Batman said evenly. “Whatever happened to bring us here, it was time or universe travel.”

The million questions Stephanie had about that would have to wait, because as much as she wanted to know and wanted to tease him, she also wanted to get home alive. A chilled, oily feeling crept over her skin at the idea that they were actually lost in the wrong century. The potential for things to go horrifically wrong was high, and they were sort of walking danger magnets.

“We need to get to a landmark that will survive,” Batman said, standing. He snapped the arrow over his knee and stripped the arrowhead off, and put it in his belt.

“That sounds like you have a plan,” Stephanie said. “You do have a plan, right?”

“I always have a plan,” he said.

“You’re full of shit,” she said, hating the tremble in her voice. She was thinking about Cass and wondering how long they’d wait to decide she and Bruce were dead if they were stuck for a while, or forever. Would they put tombstones over empty graves again? “Do you have a plan-plan or just a making it up as I go plan?”

“It’s a protocol,” Batman said, striding along the creek bed. “There’s a circuit of landmarks Booster Gold will check on a periodic basis. It’s League-only clearance. We just need to carve the signal and then wait for pick up.”

“Oh,” Stephanie said, calming her thudding heart and shoving back the rising panic. “Oh, okay. An actual plan. Uh, thank you…for uh, an explanation.”

“We’ll get home, Stephanie,” he said, pausing to face her. “If something happens to me, keep going. Find some way of learning the year and date. If we are in Britain, find Stonehenge. Use a batarang to carve the letter B followed by four digits for the year, an A for AD, and the three digit number for the current day of the year. Carve it on the interior face of the southmost stone. Go three hundred yards northeast, then find a cover within visual distance of that spot. Do you understand?”

Stephanie swallowed and nodded.

Batman looked down at her for so long she thought maybe he was angry, but he reached up and pressed the clasp that slid his lenses into the forehead of the cowl. His gray-blue eyes were slightly bloodshot, like he hadn’t slept in a while, but they were serious and concerned instead of angry.

“We will both get home or you will,” he said. “Do you understand?”

Stephanie nodded, the chill running up her spine again and dissipating into something determined.

“Yes,” she said, her mouth dry. “Yes, sir.”

“Calculate for September 2, 1598.”

Stephanie thought for a moment, running the math in her head. “B1598A245.”

“Good,” he said. “Let’s go.”

* * *

The flickering fire licked the edges of the earthen hole while Stephanie scrubbed packed dirt off the broad side of one of her batarangs. Batman had shown her how to build something he called a Dakota fire, and had helped her dig the pit and tunnel for it, and she was worried by how much more he was favoring his arm after lighting the kindling.

They’d skirted a village and a field of broken, swollen bodies in the afternoon. Batman thought he’d be mistaken for some kind of knight if they went into a town to gather information, but he didn’t want to risk any challenges until they had some distance between themselves and the territory they’d presumably trespassed on.

Stephanie didn’t think anyone assuming he was a knight would be a mistake, technically, and she told him as much while he looked at a crossroads sign through binoculars.

Now, she watched him sitting off at the edge of the circle of low light, eating a protein bar and staring up at the sky. He was doing some kind of calculation on a small notepad and she hesitated before interrupting him.

“B?”

“Hn.”

“I should clean your arm.”

He chewed for a minute. “It’s better to leave it sealed. Wait until we have a sterile environment to dress it.”

Stephanie frowned. “I can boil water in, uh. Something.”

“It’s alright, Stephanie,” he said, sounding distracted. He hummed at the paper and scowled, glanced back up at the sky and then flipped the notepad shut. “We should sleep.”

Sleep was something that was presumably happening near the small fire they’d made for warmth. Stephanie sighed and pulled her cape around herself as a blanket and took a fairly cleared spot on one side of the fire. She felt grimy in her Spoiler gear, but Bruce hadn’t made any move to remove anything— not even his cowl— so she left her stuff on.

It should have been easy to fall asleep, with how tired she was, but she stared up at the starry sky for a long time, feeling lost and very small.

“Bruce,” she said, turning her head. He was flat on his back, utterly still, and she thought he was totally out until he murmured.

“Hm?”

“What’s the protocol if it’s not time travel? What if it’s another world?”

There was another long silence.

“There isn’t one,” he finally said. “It’s…it’s very complex. It’s difficult to plan routine protocols for.”

“Oh,” Stephanie said, her stomach dropping. Her hood and cape suddenly felt too thin, unsubstantial. “Well. That’s happened to you before, right?”

“On an average of once per year, yes,” Bruce said. For someone that she was pretty sure she’d woken up a minute ago, he didn’t sound at all sleepy.

“What was the longest…the longest you were stuck somewhere? Was that when Tim found you?”

“No,” Bruce said. There was an even longer silence, so drawn out she thought he’d fallen asleep again. He cleared his throat and dispelled that.

“I should probably shut up,” Stephanie said aloud at the sky. “Ignore me.”

“Thirty seven years,” he said and Stephanie felt like a sledgehammer had cracked open her chest.

“What,” she hissed, unable to draw a deep enough breath for anything louder. “Bruce, I swear to god if this is a fucking joke, I’m going to…to…”

Her eyes stung with tears. She knew she’d survive a hard year or two, but could she do a decade and go back to the same life? Two decades? What would Cass do? Tim?

“It’s not a joke,” he said. “It was with Diana. Last summer. It only seemed like we were gone a few hours.”

Stephanie sat up, her cape gripped tightly around her shoulders. “Wait. What? Is that when…is that when Dick thought you were having some kind of breakdown?”

“Dick usually thinks I’m having some kind of breakdown,” he said mildly. “You’ll have to be more specific.”

“The time he said you hugged him for like twenty minutes and stained the shoulder of his suede jacket.” Stephanie scooted around the fire, closer to him. “He told Jason to keep an eye on you. That’s why Cass bought you Reese Cups like three times a day. Didn’t you notice?”

“The pile of candy in my locked, coded office desk drawer?” Bruce said. His voice was tight with something like regret. “Yes. I noticed. I didn’t know I ruined his jacket.”

“I really don’t think that’s the point,” Stephanie said. “He didn’t even like that jacket if it makes you feel any better?”

“Does it matter how I feel?” Bruce asked, and she couldn’t tell if he was genuinely surprised or just a weird sort of reprimanding.

“Well, I mean, _yeah_ ,” Stephanie said, resting her crossed arms on her knees. She settled her chin on her arms. “You know that saying, ‘if momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy?’”

“Yes,” Bruce said warily.

“That’s kind of how you guys are?”

“I would think that saying most aptly applies to Alfred,” Bruce said dryly.

“Maybe for _you_ ,” Stephanie said. “But not everyone else.”

“Hn,” he said. “That is…a troubling observation.”

“It’s more like, ‘if Batman is really sad, everyone else is sad.’”

“Except Jason,” Bruce said.

“ _Especially_ Jason,” Stephanie corrected. “And you know how often I find Tim or Cass moping and it’s because you’re in a bad mood?”

“That isn’t particularly reassuring,” he said.

“It’s not supposed to be,” Stephanie said with a shrug. “It just is.”

“I am often…that.”

“I’ve noticed,” Stephanie said, rolling her eyes. “If it was gonna stop anyone from caring, I think they would have stopped by now. And it’s not like you’re responsible for how everybody feels all the time. It’s just…they care, y’know? It matters.”

“Stephanie,” Bruce said, in a tone that made her tense up and clamp her mouth shut.

“I know,” she said sharply. “I need to shut up and go to sleep. Forget I said anything.”

She leaned to drag herself back on her butt around the fire and froze when he spoke.

“No. I don’t mind you talking. You’re alright, Stephanie.”

“Oh.” She decided she was too tired to crawl all the way back to the other side of the fire, and scrunched down where she was. “I care too, you know,” she grumbled into her hood,

“What?” Bruce asked.

“I said, ‘I care too, you know,’ if you _really_ have to hear it twice,” Stephanie said more loudly. “Not that you fucking deserve it.”

“I know,” he said quietly, and she knew he didn’t mean that she’d had to repeat herself.

“I mean, I didn’t mean that,” she said, remorse bitter behind her teeth. “I’m cranky and angry at this whole shitshow. I’m pissed as hell, because you know, we just got Tim back? And what if…what if…”

Stephanie, to her horror, found her face hot with tears and her throat swollen. She choked off the fear climbing through her ribs and bit her tongue, hard, until the stinging gave an excuse for the tears.

“Sorry,” she said, when she’d gotten herself under control. “Sorry, I’m fine.”

“It’s okay,” he said. “We’re going to make it back.”

Stephanie drew in a deep, long breath.

“Was it hard? Adjusting after thirty-seven years?” she asked, staring at the faintly glimmering handle of the Big Dipper.

“Yes,” he said. “And no.”

“Thank you for the exhaustive, enlightening, very thorough answer,” Stephanie said. “When is the memoir going to be published, O Verbose One?”

“Stephanie. I am trying to sleep,” Bruce said. In her peripheral vision she could see him pinching his nose through the cowl, and the glint of teeth in firelight from his smile.

“Yeah,” she said. “Sorry.”

The fire crackled.

“Are you really gonna marry Selina?”

“Stephanie.”

“Sorry, sorry,” she muttered. “Okay, but are you? For real?”

“That is the plan,” he said, sighing audibly.

“Oh my _god_.” Stephanie sat bolt upright. “That means you _proposed_. You did, didn’t you? She didn’t ask you?”

“I proposed,” he confirmed, dragging a gloved hand over his face.

“Tell me _everything_ , except the gross parts, leave those out, because I am young and impressionable and am compelled to tell two of your children everything. Was it at a fancy restaurant? Were you cheesy and romantic? I feel like you could be if you wanted to be. Hm. It wasn’t in the papers, though.”

“It was on a rooftop,” Bruce said. “Stephanie. Sleep.”

“You _didn’t_ ,” she gasped. “Robert Bruce Thomas Wayne. Did you propose _as Batman_? Bobby. Bobby Brucester. Please. Please tell me you did not.”

“If it is any consolation,” he said, sitting up and looking furtively around, like someone in the nearby woods with any connection to Gotham or Batman might have overhead classified knowledge. “She said no at first.”

“Fucking _yeah_ ,” Stephanie said. “You and your fursona can’t just go around wantonly proposing to women in masks. That’s not how this works. I cannot _believe_ you.”

“There are so many problems with what you just said that I can’t even…listen, it is not a fursona.”

Stephanie raised an eyebrow. “That’s what you honed in on, out of all the details I just included as an artful exaggeration, that’s really the one you want to fight me on.”

There were not many times Bruce looked actively exasperated while in the cowl, but this was one of them. She had seen that look a few times before, usually when he was talking about something Hal Jordan did or said.

Stephanie enjoyed it for one delicious moment and then had mercy on him.

“So. When _did_ she say yes?”

“Later,” he said obtusely, lying back down. “After we had talked.”

Stephanie groaned. “Bruce. I love you like an uncle that I’m moderately fond of. Please tell me you didn’t actually make Selina hear your pros and cons list before she accepted.”

“It was one con,” he said. “Something from a long time ago. We discussed it. I asked her again. She said yes. Now, will you please sleep. Will you let _me_ sleep?”

“Fine, fine. Sorry,” Stephanie said. She curled up on her side. “Did you cry? When she said yes?”

Bruce made a noise that was like a strangled groan.

“Sorry! I’m just curious. We don’t get a lot of time together. I have to make the most of it.”

“We have been walking together all day,” he said.

“I was distracted. By 15th or 16th century Probably England. Did you?”

He inhaled slowly and exhaled through what sounded like gritted teeth. “If I tell you yes, will you go to sleep?”

“Depends.”

“Yes, I may have cried. A very small amount.”

“It’s because you’re soft and vulnerable inside,” Stephanie said soberly. “Cass told me.”

“How fortunate I am that I have a daughter to broil me when I am not within earshot.”

“Did you mean ‘roast?’” Stephanie asked, lifting her head.

“I meant what I said,” he said tightly. “Sleep.”

“Am I invited to the wedding?” Stephanie asked. “Can I borrow your card to shop for a dress?”

“Yes, and yes,” he said. “I’m sleeping now. Good night.”

“I’m not tired,” Stephanie said. “Bruce. Br _uce_. Tell me boring facts about your antique clock collection so I can sleep.”

“They are not boring,” he said, his voice muffled. He’d dragged the cape over his face. “They’re mechanical masterpieces.”

“Hm,” Stephanie said. “Convince me.”

“Abraham-Louis Breguet made a self-winding watch that was a favorite of—”

“Okay, I’m good,” she interrupted. “Thanks. Good night.”

“Hn,” he said.

He ignored the next three things she said, or he’d actually fallen asleep. In the silence, Stephanie stared into the orange circle that was the top of their Dakota fire while worrying about what she would do if she didn’t see Gotham again for twenty years.

Finally, eventually, her eyes closed.

* * *

A low growl woke Stephanie. For a minute, she didn’t move or breathe, registering her surroundings. A knobby lump of dirt was poking her in the back and something heavy covered her, something warm. There were no plodding animal footsteps and no second growl, or snuffling.

She looked around and realized Batman’s cape was draped over her own cape, as a blanket. Bruce sat on the other side of the fire pit, the top half of his armor sitting next to him on the ground, like a turtle shell set aside for safekeeping.

He was cleaning his arm with a syringe, irrigating it.

Stephanie yawned and rubbed her eyes. “Is there anything you don’t have in that belt?”

“The kitchen sink,” he said, without looking over.

“Badum- _cchh_ ,” Stephanie said, sitting up. “Let me make the jokes, okay? What happened to waiting til we got back?”

“I reassessed,” he said.

“Shit,” Stephanie staggered to her feet and skirted around the fire, dragging the cape with her like a blanket around her shoulders. “It’s infected, isn’t it?”

He’d taken the cowl off, too, and the slight flush to his pale cheeks and brightness in his stony eyes were all she needed for confirmation.

“Lemme do that,” she said, yawning again and holding a hand out for the syringe. He didn’t give it to her.

“I’ve got it,” he said. “But I would appreciate assistance with the field dressing.”

Stephanie picked up the waiting sealed package and bounced on her toes to warm up a bit. “I don’t suppose you have antibiotics in the belt?”

“Two,” he said. “I’m saving them.”

“I can’t convince you that’s a stupid idea, can I?”

“You are welcome to try,” Bruce said. He shook the syringe and slid it back into a belt compartment. “But no, I am not particularly in the mood to be convinced. We need to keep moving.”

Stephanie sighed.

“Can you hurry and finish being stupid, then? I have to pee. I already miss indoor plumbing.”

“Go,” he said. “Look for a pine tree. A fir, if you can find one.”

“…to pee on?” Stephanie blinked at him. “Bruce. I’m not five. I can manage pissing on the ground without directions.”

“The sap,” he said, studying the deep gash on his arm. “It’s a natural antiseptic. I don’t want to waste time hunting but if you happen to see one, we should use that.”

“You know the _weirdest_ stuff,” Stephanie said, handing him the bandage. “I bet you read the backs of cereal boxes.”

“I can’t tell if that’s an insult or not,” he said. “But thank you.”

Stephanie did not find a pine tree.

She helped Bruce wrap his arm, shoved dirt into the Dakota fire pit, and ate a protein bar from her own belt.

By the time the sun was directly overhead, they’d been walking for five hours and had gathered enough information from one tiny inn to know that Stonehenge was only another day’s walk south. It took three people in the inn arguing over plates of stewed vegetables and bread to settle on the exact date: September 14th, 1595.

Stephanie, despite herself, had a hard time not looking at Bruce with open admiration for a full hour after that. He didn’t seem like he was gloating about being so close to the mark, merely unsurprised and relieved. She couldn’t decide if she considered this arrogance or not, and if she should hold it against him.

The country was populated, full of small farms and cottages and tilled lands. As much as they could, they avoided people and were mostly left alone. Stephanie wasn’t sure she would have fared as well by herself, but being tall and dressed in all black armor covered with sharp points was a powerful deterrent.

“William Shakespeare is alive right now,” he said, out of the blue sometime in the afternoon.

“Should we go get his autograph?” Stephanie asked, joking.

“Hn,” he said. “No. We can’t spare the time.”

“I was kidding,” Stephanie said. “Were you seriously considering going to ask _William Shakespeare_ for his autograph?”

“For Alfred,” he said.

“Oh.”

It was early evening when they worked their way around a large swath of farmland, keeping the road in sight on the horizon. They climbed a long slope under a thick canopy of trees, and were nearly to the crest of the hill when another arrow whirred overhead.

Stephanie dropped into a crouch at once, scanning the woods in the direction the arrow had come from. She didn’t see anything, or anyone, moving.

She glanced at Bruce. At Batman. He was also in a crouch.

“Might have been a stray,” she whispered. “From practice?”

Then came the angry shouting in late Middle English. Stephanie caught enough to understand that someone thought they were spies of some kind, and was very, _very_ not happy about it.

“Explain or run?” Stephanie asked, tensed.

“Run,” he said. “Run now.”

Stephanie took off and was a hundred feet away in a dead sprint when she realized he wasn’t following her. Screams and cries of terror sounded from the hillside, the clash of battle much larger than one man against a few archers. She stopped, hunting for him, and saw him using a thick tree for cover. He couldn’t see the swordsman coming up the incline.

Again, she sprinted, this time toward danger. She tackled the swordsman and disarmed him with a few lithe twists and kicks to keep control of the fight. She ziptied him on autopilot, forgetting for a moment she wasn’t on Gotham streets.

Batman crept toward her, using more trees for cover.

“Not spies,” he clarified. “The ambush. The attacking party must have come from the south.”

“And someone thought we were looking for the ba—”

Stephanie stopped talking because a scary little click hit her ears the same second fire exploded in her gut, and the whole world went sideways and became a kaleidoscope of raging, shrieking color. She tried to gasp for air and couldn’t.

Something rough was on her back, digging into her shoulder blades. Bark. It was bark. Had she been leaning against a tree?

The trembling in her hands was instant, and someone was pouring boiling water into her stomach over and over. She looked down, arms shaking as she patted her own abdomen helplessly.

There was an arrow sticking out of her gut.

It was a thick wooden rod, pinching into her stomach right through her Spoiler suit and thin armor, and she couldn’t fall or move because the arrow had embedded itself in the tree behind her. She was pinned, like a beetle on a board.

“Fuck,” Bruce breathed, running up the hill and away from her. She watched, her head numb, while he leapt a wall and took down a man with a crossbow. He came up from the ground with blood on his gloves.

Stephanie blinked.

Bruce was in front of her.

“Stephanie,” he said. “Stephanie, listen to me.”

“I’m stuck,” she said, choking on the words. “I’m stuck, he shot me and it…I’m stuck.”

“Stephanie, I need you to stay awake,” Bruce said, and he sounded…frantic? Scared? His own breath caught and then leveled out and his voice took on an eerie calm. “I’m going to cut the bolt behind you so the arrowhead is clear.”

“Batman,” she said. Her hands flew to the arrow sticking out of her stomach, like they couldn’t quite accept its reality. “Batman.”

“Right here. I’m going to move you, just an inch, okay? On the count of one, two…”

He moved her before three.

Stephanie screamed, and her breath in was a sob.

“It’s going to be okay,” he said.

“Fuck you,” she cried. “And…and…”

“And what else?” he said, his words quick and tight. Something was moving at her back and it hurt, it hurt so much, she gasped again and even jerking away from it made things worse. “Stephanie. Fuck me and what else? Stay awake, sweetheart.”

Her chest was dense and full of agony, and something in her broke at the gentle worry in his tone. She was weeping now, too hurt to sob, too raw to scream again.

“Dad,” she said. “Dad. He never…he never called me…anything. Like that. You’re so…I hate you sometimes. Cass needs you. Tim needs you. But I…I needed you, too. You…you fired me. I wanted…I wanted you to be…proud. He…he’s not…I couldn’t ask you. I wanted you to want to be… _my_ Dad. My Batman. Like you…you were…I believed in you.”

Something gave way behind her and she collapsed forward, the scream gurgling in her throat. Arms caught her and kept her from tumbling onto the bolt, held her up, turned her to the side and lowered her gently.

“I’m sorry,” he said roughly, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Stay awake, Stephanie.”

“I hate England,” she said, staring at the rotting leaves. “Can we go home. Bruce, I just want to go home. Please can we…”

Another now-familiar whish and snap broke the air and Bruce, standing above her, roared.

She looked up at the arrow quivering in his back, when he slowly turned to face the archer.

The fletching was gray feathers, trimmed down goose feather, she realized. Better fletching. It was an idle thought, followed by the detached realization that this was it: she was dying, for a second time, for real— in 16th century England in the middle of a fight that wasn’t even hers.

A lot of her life had felt that way, so it seemed fitting. Always and forever getting torn apart in the middle of fights she didn’t start and wouldn’t finish, like a bird being severed between two hungry cats.

Another arrow would hit Bruce and he’d collapse next to her, and they’d bleed out together on the forest floor.

The archer, far off, gave an ungodly shriek that pulled her floating attention back to the concrete reality around her. A batarang was in his wrist, his bow abandoned.

“Gotcha,” Stephanie said faintly.

She waited for Bruce to collapse.

There was another roar, this one full of frustration and fury, and Bruce didn’t collapse— he slammed himself back onto the ground so hard and fast that the leaves around them flew up in wild swirls. Something cracked. He exhaled through his teeth, growling like a wolf warning a threat away, and he sat up.

Stephanie could see now, with her hands limp and bloody on her own stomach, the broken fletching of the arrow in his back and the dripping crimson arrowhead protruding from his lower ribs where it had not been a second ago.

“No,” she said, too weakly to be heard. The word had no air in it.

He grabbed the arrow right behind the arrowhead, inhaled noisily, and pulled.

Stephanie closed her eyes and when she opened them again, he was curved, curled over himself but still somehow on his feet, his back arched in while he wheezed.

He straightened only slightly, staggered to her, and dropped to his knees. His head dipped so low she thought for a second he was going to press his head to hers, or pass out, but he stopped and looked at her. The lenses were up on the cowl. Streaks of tears snaked their way from under the cowl and down onto his chin.

“Look at me,” he ordered.

She nodded.

“I am going to get you home. Do you trust me?”

She nodded again, a hiccup of a sob stuck inside her throat.

He closed his eyes for a second, still panting, and for a wild second her confused mind thought he had just died.

“Bruce, _Bruce_ ,” she pled. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about…about leaving you. After Tim. When I…with Anarky. I was angry, but you were hurting, too. I’m sorry, B.”

“Shh,” he said. His eyes dragged back open, with obvious effort. “It’s alright. I shouldn’t have fired you from Robin, Stephanie. I was afraid. I was afraid of watching you get hurt because you wouldn’t listen, but I shouldn’t have fired you. I know I fucked up. It’s not your fault. I should have told you a long time ago.”

Stephanie didn’t see his hand because she was focused on his face, so the only warning she got was the slight, agonizing shift when he grabbed the arrow. He pulled too fast for her to have time to tense up. It still was enough to make her scream again, and then that was broken by sobs when he leaned weight, too much weight, onto her gut.

The world did not fade with flashbacks, it did not slip away into gradual haze. One moment, Stephanie was weeping and shaking and the next moment everything was black.

* * *

She woke to the jolting rhythm of being carried piggyback. Every nerve in her body protested.

“B?” she groaned, through dry lips.

“Stephanie,” he said, and he sounded relieved but robotic. Almost like Damian, when Damian was stressed. “Approximately three more hours if I maintain current pace.”

“B, stop,” she said. “Did you…what about you.”

“I’m not stopping,” he said, like steel she couldn’t bend, like it would hurt her if she tried. “You remember the date code? Recite it.”

“B…”

“Keep going, Stephanie.”

“I’m tired,” she whined. “Everything hurts. Put me down. I can walk. I can walk with you.”

“Recite. The. Code,” he said.

“B…” She let her head rest against his shoulder. It was firm but soft, his armor gone. She wondered where he’d left it, and why. “B1595A25…25…”

“Seven,” he said. “Say it again.”

“B1595A257,” she said.

“And if it’s morning?”

“Eight at the end,” she mumbled.

“Good,” he said. He sounded as exhausted as she felt. He shifted her weight and an involuntary cry escaped her. “Sorry,” he said.

“S’fine,” she said. “How are you…how. You. Still going?”

Bruce didn’t answer.

“B?”

“M’an android,” he said. “Not human.”

“You wish,” Stephanie said, her laugh muted by pain. “I told you to leave the jokes to me.”

“Stay awake and they’re all yours,” Bruce said.

“Let’s never come here again,” Stephanie said. “This is the…the worst…vacation.”

He huffed and she struggled uselessly for a second, but he didn’t slow or stop or lower her to her feet. She didn’t have the energy to shove away from him so she didn’t try. It made her feel safe in a knotted, selfish kind of security, acutely aware of what it was costing someone else and letting him pay that price. Letting him pay that _for her_.

She resolved to give herself two minutes and then she’d argue with him until he put her down and they could both walk.

A minute into that, she passed out again.

* * *

Stephanie woke with a scream and a thud that ripped another cry from her hoarse throat. She lay, tangled up with Bruce, catching her breath.

“B?” she asked. There was no answer.

The shadows of Stonehenge lay pitch black near them in the moonlight. Stephanie knelt and shook Bruce but got no response. She pulled the last batarang out of her belt, gasping when her hand brushed against her stomach.

She didn’t want to move. She wanted to stay motionless, staring into the distant fields, and never move again.

She wanted to hear Cassandra’s weirdly deep laugh, the one that startled her the first time she’d heard it. It was one of the best sounds in the world, she thought.

Stephanie watched wind blow through tall grass and wondered if Bruce loved the way his daughter laughed as much as she did. She thought probably, maybe, maybe even more than her. She shifted her gaze to him. His breathing was noisy, so she knew he was alive— drenched with blood, but alive.

If Bruce could walk god knew how far carrying her sorry ass, she could do this.

She crawled to the stone that towered above her, whimpering while she moved, then looked back at Bruce and up at the moon.

“Okay,” she told herself, gripping the batarang. “Focus.”

Stephanie made the B out of nothing but lines, hoping it didn’t look too much like an eight, and while her muddled brain pondered this problem she realized she was on the wrong side of the stone.

Southmost stone. Interior face.

The string of swears involved three languages and would have made Jason blush.

She crawled around, grumbling and gasping and groaning.

It took another thick sheaf of swears and lots of pausing for breath, but Stephanie finally finished the last number, that jagged and blocky eight. She has sagged against the cold stone sometime after the first number and let her hot face rest there. Her fingers were numb with cold and maybe, probably blood loss— the cut on her palm from the dulled batarang slipping was not helping.

She crawled around with a moan, to sit with her back against the monument and face Bruce. He was still wheezing, so she could tell he was alive. It was a polite consideration on his part, she thought, communicating something vital.

After a second, she felt too far away. What if Booster Gold came and found Batman in the wrong place and didn’t see her? She wasn’t dragging either of them however many fucking yards north or east or whatever it was he had said.

Also, also…what if Bruce was dying? What if he felt scared? She no longer operated under the childish assumption that he didn’t feel fear. And had he packed his wounds at all? She had emergency seals over the hole in her gut and her back that she hadn’t noticed at first because of pain, but explained why she wasn’t gushing blood whenever she moved.

Stephanie sucked in a breath, her head lolling against the towering stone.

“You assmunch,” she said. “I hate you. I fucking hate you for making me move right now.”

She crawled again and the world swam, dizzying and blurred. It took sheer force of will and gritted teeth and breathing through her nose to keep herself from puking, sensing she’d regret it far more if her stomach actually surrendered to that kind of activity right now.

When she’d made the past day’s protein bars stay down, she adjusted herself to sit beside him and she slipped her hand into his. His hand was hot and dry and gloveless. She wondered where the gloves had gone. It wouldn’t surprise her if he’d taken the time to bury it all somewhere. He was infuriating like that.

“B,” she said, into the midnight quiet. “I don’t hate you.”

“Unngh,” he said.

“I kinda like you. Kinda.”

“Good…kid,” he mumbled.

“Yeah, Damian is. They all are.”

“You,” he rasped. His eyes were still pinched shut. “Good kid. Not…not your dad.”

Stephanie squeezed his hand.

“Shut up.” It was the pain sloshing in her gut that was making her tear up again. “Don’t say anything you’ll regret later.”

“Regret…not saying…sooner,” he said. The squeeze he gave her hand in reply was worryingly weak. “You do. Make me proud. Fighter. Remind me of…”

“Jason?” Stephanie prompted. She knew this routine and even now it was bitter and felt unfair to both of them. The angry kids, the poor kids, the criminals’ kids, the ones who wouldn’t listen.

“No,” he said. This time the grip on her hand was firmer. “Me. Sorry.”

Stephanie started crying.

“Sorry,” he said again. “Bad…news. Considering.”

“Bruce, fucking shut up,” she said, sniffling. “You aren’t that awful. Why did you carry me? You could have sent Booster Gold back for me later.”

“Stephanie,” he said, in a tone that answered that question more thoroughly than any long explanation ever could have.

“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “You’re Batman. I know.”

“You’re one of mine,” he said, his words drifting through the air. He was losing his grip on consciousness again. “Would…do anything…to…

He was out. Still breathing, his pulse erratic under her finger when she checked, but completely out.

Stephanie didn’t think she really needed him to finish the sentence to know what he meant.

She sat, their hands linked together, and waited.

* * *

Booster Gold appeared in a silent flash half an hour later, only ten feet away from them. It was startling, no matter how many times Stephanie had seen it, seeing someone just materialize where a second later there had been no one at all.

She blinked at him. Staying awake was getting harder. She was so tired, tired down to her aching bones. Her arms hurt. Her head pounded.

“Hi,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Took you long enough.”

“I’m not a taxi service,” he said, with a lopsided grin. He crouched beside her and something in his expression grew serious. “You don’t make it to afternoon. Stopped there first.”

“Huh,” Stephanie said.

“Hold on,” he said. “This might hurt.”

Stephanie didn’t know if it was time travel or her body just being done, because she blacked out again and remembered nothing.

* * *

The room was warm and the bed beneath her was soft. Everything smelled clean— that was what she noticed even before forcing her eyelids open. Her limbs were slack enough even when she tried to tense them that she knew there were painkillers in her.

That was going to stop being the case as soon as possible, if she had anything to say about it, but maybe for now it wasn’t the worst.

She opened her eyes, not knowing what to expect— Cave? Watchtower?

It was Manor ceiling. The guest room she usually used, the one Tim and Damian both called _her_ room. She wasn’t used to them agreeing about anything, and now she felt like maybe she wanted to agree with them.

Her room.

“You awake?” Tim asked sleepily. She looked over at him, slouched in a chair. Cass was curled up next to him and blinking owlishly at her. A tiny smile curved her lips.

“Yes,” Cass said.

“Don’t move,” Tim warned her. “Dr. Thompkins had to do surgery and get fabric fragments out of you.”

“Where’s Bruce?” Stephanie asked. “Is he okay?”

“He’s fine,” Tim said. “Dr. Thompkins has you both on the good stuff and he’s got like, an elephant’s dose of antibiotics in him now. What even happened to you guys? Booster Gold dropped you off in the cave and he didn’t know anything. We thought you were both on patrol.”

“Later,” Stephanie said, not wanting to think about arrows and crossbow bolts and eternal minutes carving with a batarang. “M’tired.”

“Yeah, of course,” Tim said, with something that approximated warmth for him. He was weird about people being hurt, and got all awkward about it after.

“Cass,” Stephanie said. “Your dad said you broiled him when he meant roasted.”

The coarse, low laughter from Cassandra’s tiny slip of a body mixed with Tim’s asthmatic giggle and it was one of the most beautiful sounds Stephanie had ever heard.

* * *

Recovering in the Manor was way, way better than recovering at home and hiding things— or the extent of things— from her mom. She hadn’t had to do that in a long time, not since she’d gotten her own apartment. And recovering in her apartment sucked unless she let someone know she needed help, which Stephanie as a rule only did as a last resort.

In the Manor, Alfred delivered meals and there was a massive TV in her room and her own bathroom with a shower that had more features than a multiplex theater. She hobbled to it and sat on the shower chair with plastic taped over her sutures on both sides, and let Cass wash all the grime and gunk out of her hair. The shampoo, she thought, was stolen from Tim’s room— it was the coconut stuff he liked that Cass pilfered as often as possible.

She sat under the hot spray for as long as she could manage and then wrapped a thick robe around herself over soft pajamas and hobbled back to the bed. She didn’t think she’d ever take being warm or cozy for granted ever again, but then, she told herself that at least once a week after rainy patrols.

Bruce was sitting there, in a chair, looking haggard and damp. Cass gave him a quick hug from behind, burying her face in his hair and nuzzling like a cat, with a pleased hum.

“Cassandra,” he said.

“Hazelnut,” she said. “Good soap.”

“Go pester Alfred for brownies,” he said.

Cassandra stayed where she was a moment longer, and Stephanie could see the thoughtful expression that was hidden from Bruce.

“You should be in bed,” she chided. “It was bad?”

“Soon,” he said, with a weary sag in his shoulders. “It was as bad as it looks, but not as bad as you feel.”

“Mm,” Cassandra said seriously. “Want a brownie?”

“Two,” he said.

She left, silent as a shadow.

“Booster Gold said we didn’t make it to the afternoon,” Stephanie said when she was sure Cassandra was gone, while sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed. She wanted to lie down, but she stayed upright, facing him.

“I know,” Bruce said. “He found a man experimenting with a stolen time travel device near the block where we both were patrolling. As far as we can tell, nobody else went missing. I thought you’d want to know.”

“Oh,” Stephanie said. “Okay.”

“Stephanie,” he said. “I’m…it shouldn’t have happened.”

She decided sitting up was a bad idea and lay back on the bed after all, curled on her side facing him.

“At least it wasn’t thirty seven years,” she said, trying to joke.

“You did well,” he said abruptly. “You did exactly what you were supposed to do. It saved our lives.”

“I think it was a team effort,” Stephanie said, while a warmth that was definitely not the robe or the blankets washed over her, and dulled the pain in her stomach. She thought of the hours she’d lost, however many she didn’t even have memories of while he’d carried her. “You did a little bit of the work. I’m proud of you.”

His laugh was not like Cassandra’s, even though it was deep. It was dry and grated, like rock grinding against pavement. He winced and pressed a hand to his ribs.

“I try,” he said, pushing himself to his feet.

“Can you stay?” Stephanie asked, biting her lip. “For just a bit? I won’t let anyone yell at you. Unless you’re just in too much pain, then I mean, ignore me. Forget I asked. It’s fine, I’m gonna try to sleep, and it was dumb.”

A hand rough with callouses brushed her hair back off her forehead and Bruce leaned over, pressed a kiss to her brow. He sat back in the chair and exhaled at the ceiling.

“I’ll stay,” he said. “It’s not dumb.”

“Okay,” Stephanie said. “I don’t hate you, you know. Even sometimes when I say I do. Jason doesn’t either.”

“I know,” he said. “I’m a detective.”

Stephanie was falling asleep watching his chest move in and out, deeply relieved in every part of her that she didn’t need to watch for a dying breath. It meant it was soothing instead of panic-inducing.

“You,” she said, “are a fucking…”

“Sleep, Stephanie. I kind of like you, too.”

“Aw, B, that’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard you say,” she smiled drowsily. “Say it again.”

“Sleep, Stephanie.”

She cracked one eye to glare at him. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I kind of like you, too,” he said, half-asleep in the chair.

She smiled. “I noticed. I was trained by a detective.”

This time, his laugh was punctuated by a string of cuss words that made her laugh and cuss just as much. They exhaled shaky breaths at the same time and Bruce said, simply, “Don’t.”

“I have regrets,” she said, deciding she wasn’t going to laugh again for at least five years. Maybe six. “Putting on the cape isn’t one of them.”

“I know,” he said quietly. “You’re like me.”

Stephanie considered that again, considered teasing him about all the ways that was hardly a compliment, and then she thought about him pulling an arrow out of his own chest to keep a promise to get her home. He had flaws but he was still Batman, the Batman that she’d watched for from her roof at ten years old; the one who made her believe she could be a hero, no matter what her parents did. Running headlong into his human failures hadn’t changed that, even if it complicated things sometimes.

And wasn’t that reassuring, after all? To know if he could screw up and still be Batman, that she didn’t have to be perfect to be a hero? She didn’t have to be flawless to deface a world wonder with a date code to save some lives, while dying in the wrong century. They both fucked up sometimes, but they were both still the heroes that wouldn’t quit no matter what was thrown at them.

She met his gaze, and held it. She wasn’t joking when she said, simply and seriously:

“Good. I want to be.”


End file.
